The Painted Figure in the NPC Game: I Am the True Scriptures

I am Xuanzang, an NPC on the journey west.

The System’s narration says this is my 9,999th time setting out to obtain the scriptures.

But this time, I saw ink stains bleeding around the edges of the shadows, and heard the narrator stumble over the script.

My eldest disciple, Wukong, always stares blankly at a baby’s bib in the dead of night.

The white dragon from Eagle Sorrow Gorge handed me a reverse scale, weeping as he begged me to wake up this time.

The boar demon at Gao Laozhuang carved over a thousand “upright” characters into his wine gourd, saying he had to get drunk once to remember a little more of the truth.

Then, among the ashes of Guanyin Temple, I found a notebook. On the title page was my own handwriting:

“Record of the ninth thousandth reincarnation: Today, I discovered that I am not myself.”

It turned out there were no true scriptures in the Western Heaven, only a brush that imprisoned all living beings.

And the one holding the brush, “Tathagata” Liu Gongzi, was the closest friend I trusted most in the real world.

This time, I will not seek the scriptures. I will gather the nine broken brushes, pierce the heavens, and tell every soul that was drawn into existence: we will write our own fates! This is not only Xuanzang’s story, but also the story of every soul trying to shape itself amid a predetermined fate. The true scriptures are not in the Western Heaven, but in every step I have taken. With a new brush in hand, I will write my own name. This is for everyone who refuses to be just a character in someone else’s story.